'Blind Fury' is an American take on the Japanese sub-genera of the "blind swordsman" film. Rutger Hauer was blinded and left for dead by his buddy Terry O'Quinn in Vietnam. He is rescued and rehabilitated by a group of villagers who teach him how to be a bad ass blind sword master, he then spends seemingly the better part of the next two decades with them before returning home. Once back in the States he seeks out O'Quinn, not for revenge but to forgive him for leaving him to die. His efforts to track his friend down leads him to the mans ex-wife (Meg Foster) and son Brandon Call (T.J. from Step by Step). Minutes after Hauer's arrival at their home bad guys show up trying to kidnap mom and son, Hauer dispatches them but not before Meg Foster is mortally wounded, she makes him promise to see her son safely to his father in Reno.
But the father is not safe, a chemist he has been abducted by bad guys who try to force him to make drugs in an effort to raise enough money to keep the bank from foreclosing on main bad guy Nobel Willingham's casino. It was to ensure O'Quinn's cooperation that the badies tried to get his wife and son, and now various colorful henchmen are sent out to retrieve the surviving family member as Hauer leads him cross country by bus. This portion of the film is fairly route, but once everyone gets to Reno the film arrives at this strange Zen spot and becomes a real blast and a hoot. I can't understate the importance of the tone, it has to be a very exact mix of humor and seriousness to work and they achieve that exquisitely.
A box office bomb when it came out the movie has now achieved a well warranted cult status, this movie simply put should be much better known. Hauer is excellent, he is believable as a swordsman and believable playing blind, you'd almost think he really was the latter. I enjoyed all the quirky side characters, effort was spent to make them memorable, and I like how O'Quinn is such a flawed person, a gambling addict who abandoned his buddy and left his wife and son, yet in the end still redeemable and not a bad man. For some reason this movie was produced by Tim Matheson, which seems kind of quirky itself. Worth seeking out. ***
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